St. Mary’s County Catholic school students and parishioners gathered Feb. 2 at the reconstructed Brick Chapel in St. Mary's City to participate in the first Candlemas Day Mass celebrated there since the 17th century.

The Mass is significant because the chapel – constructed over where the original 1667 structure was built – is situated to face the rising sun on Candlemas Day, which is also called the Feast of the Presentation of the Lord or the Purification of Mary.

“Catholic liturgical practice has long called for churches to be aligned on a true east-west orientation,” said Patrick Elder, and eighth-grade teacher at St. John School in Hollywood who coordinated the special Mass. “However, the Brick Chapel of 1667 is aligned at 11 degrees off of a true east-west orientation.”

“There is a Catholic tradition of orienting buildings to the rising sun on the feast day of the saint to whom the church is dedicated and the sun rises directly in line with the church foundation on Feb. 2,” the educator said.

He added that “the Jesuit priests who built this church 350 years ago had it face the rising sun on this day – Candlemas – so that there is equal light coming on both sides of the chapel at sunrise.”

Candlemas is also known as the Feast of the Presentation of the Lord and the Feast of the Purification of the Blessed Virgin Mary. The feast celebrates the presentation of Christ in the temple at Jerusalem on the 40th day after His birth. The term Candlemas comes from the Gospel reading for Mass, Luke 2:22-40, in which Simeon beholds the Child Jesus and praises God because Jesus will be “a light for revelation to the Gentiles and for glory to your people Israel.”

Pete Himmelheber, an iron worker who created the cross atop the Brick Chapel and who describes himself as “a crazy volunteer here,” said scientists spent an entire winter visiting the chapel each morning to determine what day of the year the chapel faces sunrise.

“The altar is skewered to see sunrise here,” he said. “We are still trying to figure out the orientation of other churches.”

Catholic school students from St. John School and St. Michael School in Ridge gathered in the predawn darkness with parishioners from St. Cecilia Parish in St. Mary’s City, St. John and St. Michael parishes for the sunrise Mass, which was celebrated by Father Raymond Schmidt, pastor of St. John’s.

As light from the 7:10 a.m. sunrise filled the chapel, Father Schmidt blessed candles, a Catholic tradition for the feast day.

Noting that he was celebrating the Mass ad orientem (toward the east with his back to the congregation), Father Schmidt said “we turn to the east to recognize the Son of God who rises for us. Since I am facing the same direction, we will walk together with light toward the light which is Christ.”

English settlers first arrived in Maryland on the Feast of the Annunciation, March 25, 1634, at nearby St. Clement's Island, a day commemorated each year as Maryland Day. On that day, Jesuit Father Andrew White celebrated the first Catholic Mass in the English-speaking colonies for the settlers who landed on the small island.

The reconstructed Brick Chapel at St. Mary's City was originally built as a Catholic chapel in 1667 in what was then the capital of Maryland. In 1704, by order of the royal governor, the door to the Catholic chapel in St. Mary's City was locked. A period of persecution against Catholics began in Maryland as Catholics in the colony were barred from holding office and from voting. They had to pay double taxes and were not allowed to publically worship. Masses were held in private homes.

In 1997, efforts began to raise money to rebuild the chapel, and by 2009, the reconstructed Chapel was completed. That year, Cardinal Donald Wuerl of Washington participated in a ceremony at the Brick Chapel in St. Mary's City, at which its doors were unlocked, using a replica of the key believed to have locked the original chapel in 1704.

The Brick Chapel is located at what is called Chapel Field. The field also includes a pavilion near the reconstructed chapel that outlines the history religious freedom in Maryland and the United States.

Elder called the area “as hallowed as ground can get” because the land also incudes the graves of hundreds of Maryland’s early Catholics, including those who landed with Father White. Also at the site are three rare lead coffins, and found to be the final resting place for Maryland’s fifth governor, Philip Calvert, his wife Anne Wolseley Calvert, and an infant child. They were relatives of Lord Baltimore, Cecil Calvert, was an English lord and convert to Catholicism who founded the Maryland colony in 1634.

 “A very large percentage of 17th century Catholic Maryland is buried here,” Elder said. He added that the gravesites are also situated 11 degrees off of a true east-west orientation

Noting that the feast day is also known as the Purification of the Blessed Virgin Mary, Father Schmidt reminded those at the sunrise Mass to “be pure of heart – only the pure of heart see God.”

Father Schmidt said that the readings in which the prophetess Anna and Simeon behold the Child Jesus shows that “worship of the Lord is rewarded.”

“Listen to the voice of the Lord, and not the voice of the world,” Father Schmidt said. “Worship transforms us.”